The Sinclair QL Forum

Ah!

Hi,

I have 4 Superhermes boards with broken pins, which need a little attention. I will try and get these repaired and offer them for sale.

I did not really like the construction of the Superhermes pins, which are esy to damage. Also the keyboard driver has to loaded externally, Only the initial F1-F4 keys work till the keyboard driver is loaded.

I like the look of the USB board, is the keyboard driver loaded on a rom chip, I think USB is the way to go.

I will await the sale of it and will want to buy one.

If you can repair the superHermes, I would like to get one. But...no hurry

I would like to buy a broken superhermes if you would sell one to me.

One of these USB adapters could be the final piece of the puzzle in my lego QL case project. I was trying to find a way of using the top half of the QL keyboard in a lego case but it might be way easier and better to dismantle a cheap USB one and embedded that somehow into the case.

Or I could go the QL prototype chimney design and have the USB keyboard just separate.

Good evening,

wrote a lengthy update that got lost in preview. Can't be bothered to write it again....

Executive summary: found a couple of mechanical and electrical problems with the first prototype plus finally properly understood the ctl-shift-alt key wiring. Second prototype version designed and currently in manufacturing in China. Expecting to receive the batch of five in approx three weeks.

Other lessons learned:
- don't try to program a 3.3V Atmel328p with a 5V programmer. It will work once or twice but then the inputs are toaat (used the wrong voltage level by accident)
- soldering fine pitch surface mount components is surprisingly easy with the aid of a couple of great Youtube tutorials

Pics:
v1 prototype with a patch jumper wire fitted inside BBQL
https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/544 ... 221608.jpg

The PLCC socket is a couple of millimeters too high, needs to be replace with a low profile SMD socket:
https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/544 ... 221649.jpg

Edit: and am also toying with the idea of adding support for a USB mouse. Need some ideas on implementation, though. Current inkling of an idea would be to talk sermouse protocol to the serial port pins on the 8049 and patch the control signal from the zx8302. Problem being, can't connect outputs from the RS-232 voltage level translator chip together with the 328p outputs so need to figure out something around that, help or better ideas would be much appreciated. QIMI mouse emulation is pretty much a dead end because it needs memory mapped IO which the 8049 socket can't provide.

pics not public access ?

Silvester wrote:pics not public access ?

Hey Silvester, thanks for catching that! Fixed now

Cheers,
Petri

>...am also toying with the idea of adding support for a USB mouse. Need some ideas on implementation, though. Current inkling of an idea would be to talk sermouse protocol to the serial port pins on the 8049 and patch the control signal from the zx8302.

Given your present design, perhaps in the short term you could just implement cursor keys emulation for movement, with space/enter from buttons. The only other option that comes to mind is perhaps using spare IO on 8049 and mouse driver on QL polling IPC.

Like others, I would rather expend the software effort in a complete 8049 replacement: USB keyboard/mouse, serial and perhaps polyphonic sound (like SAA1099, or ZX AY emulation).

My schon PS/2 keyboard is on its last legs, dreadful key bounce on my SGC/Qubide/Aurora machine. So necessity is sure to soon become the mother of invention...

Silvester wrote: My Schön PS/2 keyboard is on its last legs, dreadful key bounce on my SGC/Qubide/Aurora machine. So necessity is sure to soon become the mother of invention...

I also had this. Lasts two years, then the same faults. Not the best of Keyboard Productions. Sorry for Christopher Smith.